


Everything but that

by Keenir



Category: Once Upon a Time (TV)
Genre: Coda, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-11-21
Updated: 2014-11-21
Packaged: 2018-02-26 11:21:12
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,174
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2650187
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Keenir/pseuds/Keenir
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Evil Queens and Saviors...what they have in common.</p><p>Coda to <span class="u">The Snow Queen</span>.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Everything but that

**Author's Note:**

> the first part is Regina's thoughts...or a note she wrote.

_Ears hear what tongues wag._

_'Today is not one of those days.'  So said Robin to me._

_I know how the gossips and my enemies and the doubters will read this.  And I didn't care before what they thought, and that's still true._

_But their words will reach Henry's ears.  And Roland's.  And I know what they will hear:_

_'Regina, the evil queen, like Cora her mother.'_

_'Regina, who claimed to seek redemption, lying all the way, to lure the great and the good away from the righteous path.'_

* * *

After sitting in her car at the overlook for a good long while, Emma got out of her car and stood a few feet from the edge.  Stood there, watching the town lights.  She could easily imagine everyone forming search parties to look for her, scouring all the places she'd retreated to in times past - these few years - and asking everyone they came across 'have you seen Emma?'

She could also imagine - with no difficulty - everyone settling in at dinner tables across the community, smiling and chatting happily now that the latest danger had passed: there were no more monsters in Storybrooke, at least for the time being.  The Snow Queen was gone...as was Emma.  She kicked some pebbles, watching as they rose into the air and arced away from her, down -

And stopped.  In midair.

"Really?" Emma asked, fully expecting to see - once again - the Snow Queen when she turned around.  And though she turned around, she didn't see Elsa's aunt.

"Really, Miss Swan, if you're going to draw attention to yourself, you could just as easily drive back into town," Regina said.

"I - I didn't see you there," Emma said as Regina stepped around a small shrub, out to the parking space.

"Yes, that's rather the point of a cloaking spell," Regina said, none of her usual bite to her voice.

"I can go if you'd rather," Emma offered, knowing that there were times to push and there were times to not prod the sleeping dragon.

"No, don't bother.  They'd follow you up here, and rope me into helping look for you.  I'll go."

"Nah."

"'Nah'?" Regina asked.

"Yeah, there's no need for you to go - because nobody'll be coming to look for me," Emma said.

"That would be a first."

"It was.  You weren't there, Regina.  You didn't see the looks on their faces... Okay, you probably have, but not aimed at me."

"Ah," Regina said.  "The honeymoon's over, is it?"

Emma nodded.  "I'd be surprised if they weren't sharpening the pitchforks right now."

Regina considered, then relented.  "Fine.  Pick a spot and make yourself comfortable," figuring that if the townspeople came roaring up here with a hope to hunt a monster, she could remind them why that was never a good idea - here or in the Enchanted Forest.

"So," Emma asked after a while that felt as long as she'd waited in her car, "what brings you up here?"

"You mean you can't guess?"

"Well, I'd say Operation Mongoose, but all I know is its name - Henry couldn't even tell me that much, I overheard it," Emma said quickly.  "And you don't strike me as standing up here for a covert mission.  No offense."

"None taken," Regina said.

"Which leaves... Robin."

Regina said nothing.

"Anything I can do?" Emma offered.  "Assuming I don't blast a hole in him by accident, or burn down the woods, also by accident."

"If he listens to you, then yes, Miss Swan, there is a message you can give him.  You can tell him to stop leaving his wife's side, to not come after me, to..."

"Right about now, I'm beginning to wish I'd found some other way of stopping Zelena's time thing," what with Marian, the Snow Queen, and who knows what else just waiting for the right moment to announce itself. 

"That makes two of us in agreement," Regina said.

"Though I'm kinda surprised you haven't simply used your powers...nevermind."

"I can't exactly use my magic to repel Robin," Regina said.  "For the same reason I can't kill Marian."

Emma saw: had seen it as soon as she'd said she was surprised.  "Because, either way, Henry would see it as backsliding."

"Back to my Evil Queen ways."

"And even if Henry didn't see your magicking Robin to not like you anymore, Mary Margaret and the others would."

"And I'd not be allowed anywhere near Henry.  Again," Regina said, letting one exhaled breath hold all her weariness.

"So you came out here," Emma said.

"Alone, yes.  Or that was my intent."

"Yeah, about that, sorry," Emma said.  "I just needed to get out of town," unsure if she should end that with 'for a while' or not.

"You're still the only person here who can leave Storybrooke without being impacted by the town line," Regina said.  "You, Henry, and the Snow Queen."

"Wall of ice notwithstanding, I was tempted," Emma said.

"Temptation isn't enough," Regina said.

"Voice of experience.  Both of us."

"That's the trouble with being queen, or mayor," Regina said.  "You have to be strong enough to do what needs to be done."

"Even if nobody else is strong enough," Emma said.

"Particularly then."

"You ever had days where you wanted to chuck it all in, Regina, and leave the kingdom or town to rot, and go where you want?" Emma asked.

"More than you'd think, Swan, more than you'd think," Regina said.

"What stopped you?"

"Daniel and Henry."

Emma frowned.  "Our son...and your late boyfriend?"

"Our son is a factor, yes.  But when I was queen, I was motivated by the memory of Daniel.  And all my life, the one person who supported me unconditionally, was my father."

Remembering a name in the mausoleum when she'd gone there to try to stop the then-wicked mayor, Emma said, "Henry Mills...the other Henry Mills."

"Yes.  And the only way to fully enact my revenge and to gain my son - our son - was to cast the Curse.  Which required the heart of the one thing I loved in the world."

"So you stayed as mayor...both for our son's sake, and to keep your father's death from being in vain."

Regina nodded.

Emma considered how many hearts she could possibly use for something like that - her son, and...A very short list.

"I could and perhaps should ask you why you're asking - considering a career change?" Regina asked, trying to joke, but her own heart not being in it.

"More like I've been fired from my job," Emma said.

"Sheriff?"

"My other job."

"I see.  And now they've turned on their savior," Regina said.  "I suspected they would eventually - but the timing is strange."

"Wait, you knew?"

"One thing I've learned as well as Mary Margaret and Gold, Miss Swan, is that everything happens eventually.  Except for happy endings.  Only the heroes and heroines get those."

"You got one too, Regina," Emma said.

"And now here I stand, with the Savior of Storybrooke, far from people."

Emma couldn't argue with that.


End file.
